Music festivals are nearly 50x more expensive than they were in the 1980s. What is driving the rising price of these events?
Music festivals are one of the most popular entertainment destinations in the world. Pick a genre, any genre, and you will find dozens of festivals looking to give fans access to the biggest stars of today. Some of these events have become internationally recognized, like Coachella, while others are considered ‘best-kept secrets’ that fans desperately want to keep below the radar. Whatever the case, the market for these events is booming, and that has caused a surge in pricing that seems unstoppable.
But how did we get here? Music festivals have been around for fifty years, but the cost to attend only began to skyrocket in the last decade. The number of artists performing is roughly the same as it always has been, as is the capacity of the event, so what happened?
Recently, The Economist took notice of the music festival market. The publication was so intrigued by the economics of festivals that it made a short documentary searching for the answer to every fans’ biggest question: Why do these events cost so much?
There is no easy answer because festivals are not simple businesses. Festivals build and dismantle a small town in a matter of days that is overrun with people from all walks of life who need food, water, bathroom facilities, and (usually) campgrounds. They also need to hire artists, each of which has demands and costs. There’s also the competition from other festivals to book popular artists, which only raises the costs of locking down great performers even higher.
But consumers may have hit their limit. Nearly every major festival saw a decline in attendance during the 2018 season. That kind of downturn is likely to shake investors and event producers worldwide. Festivals are big business, but unless people are willing to pay the high prices they demand the market will be unable to sustain a large number of events currently in existence.
